[nostrademons]

Leverage & frugality.

Double 3/1 duplexes in Queens go for about $1M; the monthly payments on this are about $5200/month [1]. Each unit will rent for about $2700/month [2][3], so you're making a profit of about $200/month and paying down the principal steadily. You just need to cover a $200K down-payment. Minimum wage in NYC is $15/hour, so a two-earner couple working 40-hour weeks makes about $60K/year; it could be up to $90K if they each have work 12 hour days, as many Chinese immigrants do. Live in a 1BR apartment and you're spending about $15K/year on rent, maybe $25-30K/year on all expenses. You can save up for that down payment in about 4 years.

I don't have too much sympathy for them because the risk of being unable to find a tenant and hence unable to make your mortgage payment is precisely why not everybody levers up as much as possible to buy a rental property. But that's how the numbers work out. Most people on HN could probably do it, if they had the savings habits and risk tolerance of that couple.

[1] https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/17520-Baisley-Blvd-Jamaic...

[2] https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/131-19-134th-St-South-Ozo...

[3] https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/180-05-90th-Ave-FLOOR-1-J...

[heavyset_go]

Statistically, it's just as likely, or more likely[1], that the owners inherited the properties, which is how most wealth is acquired.

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/us-policy/2019/02/06/people-l...

[nostrademons]

The article is about immigrants. The parents of immigrants don't live in the U.S, so it's extremely unlikely that they got property through inheritance. (You can't apply statistical conclusions about a large group [all Americans] to individual subgroups [Chinese immigrant waiters & home-care providers] without adjusting your priors, and in this case there is a very strong prior for "parents did not own property in the U.S.")

[heavyset_go]

There is nothing stopping family members in the US from gifting or passing on property to their immigrant family members, or inheriting property through marriage.